New Delhi: UGC Chairman M Jagadesh Kumar on Thursday said that no formal decision has been taken on the merger of medical entrance exam NEET and engineering entrance exam JEE with CUET-UG and nothing will be imposed on the students.
Kumar’s remarks came two days after Union Education Minister Dharmendra Pradhan said that there is no plan to merge JEE and NEET with Common University Entrance Test (CUET) for the next two years.
The University Grants Commission (UGC) chief had last month announced that Joint Entrance Examination (JEE) and National Eligibility cum Entrance Test (NEET) will be merged into CUET in future.
“The merger of NEET and JEE with CUET is an idea that we are floating, so that there is a wide discussion among the stakeholders, no formal decision has been taken on this… from above nothing will be imposed on the students that from next year there There will be a joint test,” Kumar said.
The UGC chief made the remarks at a round table meeting on the topic “Enhancing the Competitiveness and Quality Revolution in Indian Higher Education”.
“Even if a decision is taken, it should not affect the existing students who are in class 11th and 12th. We need to give them enough time, at least in the next two years it will not be implemented. This will be done after adequate consultation and the feedback has been taken into account,” he said.
The first edition of CUET-UG began in July and was marred with glitches prompting the National Testing Agency (NTA) to cancel the exam at several centres.
With 14.9 lakh registrations, CUET, the common gateway for undergraduate admissions to all central universities, is now the second largest entrance exam in the country, surpassing JEE-Main’s average registration of nine lakhs.
NEET-UG is the biggest entrance exam in India, with an average of 18 lakh registrations.
While JEE-Mains is a computer-based test (CBT) conducted twice a year, NEET is conducted in pen-and-paper mode.
This report is automatically generated from PTI news service. ThePrint assumes no responsibility for its contents.
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